[SniffaXxX]

4 good raiders can lay a smack down on 1 good antagonist any day. That's just simple math. So here's an idea for just a little something to help out the antagonist a little.

A card slot that's only active for antagonist. Other than that it would function the same as the other two card slots using faction points to acquire.

The effects could alter the game in many different ways. Things like increasing raider spawn time or decreasing antagonist spawn time. Movement speed boosts. Increasing NPC health or damage. Things of that nature. Only one card active at a time of course.

[Angeles2099]

This is a great idea, but i believe first the games matchmaking should be fixed for this to be applicable. Putting this in now could be either just the thing needed to give the antagonist a fighting chance against a tight-nit group of raiders that never leave each others side or it could be absolutely overkill for the Antagonist.

But in a perfectly balanced game this again is great. You can have cards that:
*Have Support AI flock to you when you reach Half health.
*Temporally enable Raider Friendly-Fire.
*Enhance enemy HP while in there vicinity.
*Nearby friendly AI have no stress levels.
*Increased HP while near an Elite soldier/enemy.

to name a few.

[Shoggoth_Poot]

I think that Antagonists may have an unfair advantage as it is, considering that all of the AI baddies are on their side. And boss fights? Forget about it. This is coming from a player that plays, primarily, as an Antagonist. I've had some very cohesive groups, who were doing a great job of laying the smack on me when I was being all aggro and not particularly strategic in my approach, still end up with a Loss because the combination of enemies, boss, and Antagonist became an insurmountable wave of frustrating nonsense. If you know how to use the enemies to your advantage, the Raiders don't really stand a chance, and it ends up becoming an endless wave of enemies, plus an antagonist, versus four. Which is not fair. There have been enough people voicing their frustration over the lack of options for turning PvP off because the Antagonist factor is such an unwelcome (and unprofitable) deterrence from them enjoying and continuing to play the game, that if you were to give the Antagonist any more of an advantage, making them even more annoying to those who do not want to play PvP, then you may end up permanently losing a considerable amount of the player base. I think.
I mean, it could be interesting to give the Antagonist more of an advantage if there was a considerably greater (and guaranteed) reward for the Raiders, and those who did not want it could opt out of it altogether. Like, once the campaigns have all been released, if the developers implement some special event Raids where the Antagonist is an even greater pain in the Aleph injector. That could be fun, but players should have the option whether or not to participate. And the rewards should be boss awesome sauce.
Yeah.

[TheBrentWoody]

See, this is where our opinions differ.  There are -afew- maps where things get really hairy as a team against an antagonist.  BUT, most maps are so controllable that the only real wild card is the antagonist.   Enemy Within if you have two weapons that can deal real damage to objectives then it's pretty cakey.  Beast Lair is very similar.   Aneska is even easier , people just haven't adjusted to it yet.   We run it with or without an antag in about seven to nine minutes. 

KUZZMAN on the other hand is overtuned on In Shock, and until that gets adjusted it will always be super frustrating. 

[Shoggoth_Poot]

Thank you, TheBrentWoody, your opinion is always appreciated and valued by the RotBP community. But...how do you feel about Antagonist card advantage thing? Hmmm? Please give us your opinion on that.
(I'm being sincere here. Not sure if I'm coming across that way.)

[puffy99]

I think they need to guarantee at least a gold and a blue on a win with an Antag, at least a Blue on a loss, and the Antag gets a guaranteed gold or 2 blue choice on a win against a full squad that is evenly matched.  They need to fix the reward RNG first before messing with anything else. It is the one really poorly thought out mechanism in this game and i bet makes more people rage quit then anything else.. Obviously they need to hire a full time guy just to build blueprints/Weps.

[Angeles2099]

My god, on higher MMR  where your pitted against lvl 80  and up Raiders, all who are pros at there favorite characters and never leave each others side, plus know the mission like the back of there hand.....im telling that is truly an uphill battle that isnt in your favor.

If Antagonist Cards ever do come to the Game then it should be Exclusive to high MMR players.

[SniffaXxX]

You all raise some good points. The whole concept of antagonist is very tricky. The games really differ on a player to player basis and any shift in balance could have a dramatic shift depending on new vs experienced players on either side. Another thought to this i just had was what if instead of have an antagonist card, you could get an antagonist modifier randomly selected at the start of the game? Same game effect ideas as before. But the player wouldn't get to choose it.

[LordDraco3]

I wish the antagonist had some kind of equalizer akin to the Cortez aleph payment. Cortez needs his price drastically reduced still, maybe 10k AT MOST, but he is still an option for Raiders that may need a little extra push. Currently if antags just get killed within 5 seconds of spawning, over and over and over again, there is hardly any way to elevate yourself. The game does not compensate for a perma-dead antagonist, and sometimes we spend more time waiting to respawn than we do actually playing, which is not very fun. Wins can still be pulled out of nowhere, as I have done many times continuing to battle past a point I thought I would not recover from, but not everyone can do that.

If we are talking about antag-only mods, perhaps have some that trigger when dead, or trigger after x number of seconds have passed awaiting respawn (the forced timer, not the player delaying their spawn on purpose). So if I've spent a total of 60 seconds awaiting respawn, an enemy spawn is triggered, or my next spawn gives me +10 seconds of invulnerability at the start, or my first successful melee or shot does +100% damage.

[Level9Drow]

I wish the antagonist had some kind of equalizer akin to the Cortez aleph payment. Cortez needs his price drastically reduced still, maybe 10k AT MOST, but he is still an option for Raiders that may need a little extra push. Currently if antags just get killed within 5 seconds of spawning, over and over and over again, there is hardly any way to elevate yourself. The game does not compensate for a perma-dead antagonist, and sometimes we spend more time waiting to respawn than we do actually playing, which is not very fun. Wins can still be pulled out of nowhere, as I have done many times continuing to battle past a point I thought I would not recover from, but not everyone can do that.

If we are talking about antag-only mods, perhaps have some that trigger when dead, or trigger after x number of seconds have passed awaiting respawn (the forced timer, not the player delaying their spawn on purpose). So if I've spent a total of 60 seconds awaiting respawn, an enemy spawn is triggered, or my next spawn gives me +10 seconds of invulnerability at the start, or my first successful melee or shot does +100% damage.

Or maybe more map options. Like they can shoot from the tanks on Short Fused, or they can call for mooks to defend them, like the Snipers do.

BUT FIRST they have to fix the problem with mooks being super Sayan with one hit melee and 800 plus health before they give more things to antagonists. Antag should never win an AFK game unless you are up against total neeb players, and the games I was AFK in I assure you were the complete opposite of noobs.

[Power Penguin]

I wish the antagonist had some kind of equalizer akin to the Cortez aleph payment. Cortez needs his price drastically reduced still, maybe 10k AT MOST, but he is still an option for Raiders that may need a little extra push. Currently if antags just get killed within 5 seconds of spawning, over and over and over again, there is hardly any way to elevate yourself. The game does not compensate for a perma-dead antagonist, and sometimes we spend more time waiting to respawn than we do actually playing, which is not very fun. Wins can still be pulled out of nowhere, as I have done many times continuing to battle past a point I thought I would not recover from, but not everyone can do that.

If we are talking about antag-only mods, perhaps have some that trigger when dead, or trigger after x number of seconds have passed awaiting respawn (the forced timer, not the player delaying their spawn on purpose). So if I've spent a total of 60 seconds awaiting respawn, an enemy spawn is triggered, or my next spawn gives me +10 seconds of invulnerability at the start, or my first successful melee or shot does +100% damage.

Or maybe more map options. Like they can shoot from the tanks on Short Fused, or they can call for mooks to defend them, like the Snipers do.

BUT FIRST they have to fix the problem with mooks being super Sayan with one hit melee and 800 plus health before they give more things to antagonists. Antag should never win an AFK game unless you are up against total neeb players, and the games I was AFK in I assure you were the complete opposite of noobs.

I like the idea that instead of pumping regular enemies with extra damage and extra health (some scaling would be needed bit not to the same degree that it is now) that the game would summon deadlier more specialised types of elites. I remember a while back they where suggesting having basically elites that could share some of the Raider's powers i.e. Lycus's shield or Hans's jetpack (it makes sense since they are just using specialised equipment). Also elites that can lock in a player like the hunter from left  4 dead ( I imagined it being the elites that uses Lycus's shield), enemies that can create areas of denial or enemies that are heavily plated from the front but take extra damage if shot in the back.

[XjabberwockieX]

^ THIS ^ I was just commenting earlier that nothing bugs me quite as bad as a super saiyan mook shotgunning me into a injured state, right after sidestepping my melee attempt. More elites with raider type powers and aleph? Yes please. Hulked out basic infantry? The kind that take around 2 clips of a souped up gun to drop? No thanks.

[Level9Drow]

Well they kind of already have raider abilities. When the fatties (Wardog and Hedes Division) have an Aleph charge they berzerk and crackle with yellow lightning for a limited time and can't be CQC and are only wounded by weapon fire; The snipers (Wardog, Hades Division and 5th Council) teleport when you get near them when they have Aleph charges; and the Commanders (Wardog and Hades Division) call in airstrikes with their Aleph charges. I don't think I want them to have more than this.

By the way, 5th Council need commander units to, berzerkers would be weird though since berzerking isn't something a cybernetically augmented unit would do  since 5th council is all about order, control and regiment.

Before any of the above suggestions though, I have to stress that we have to get rid of Super Mooks first. This has to be fixed. I AFK in games as a 70ish level antagonist against level 120th to 150th level raiders and the MOOKS carry me without me even having to spawn. they MURDER highly skilled players without me lifting a finger. This has to stop.

[Power Penguin]

Well they kind of already have raider abilities. When the fatties (Wardog and Hedes Division) have an Aleph charge they berzerk and crackle with yellow lightning for a limited time and can't be CQC and are only wounded by weapon fire; The snipers (Wardog, Hades Division and 5th Council) teleport when you get near them when they have Aleph charges; and the Commanders (Wardog and Hades Division) call in airstrikes with their Aleph charges. I don't think I want them to have more than this.

What I meant was that the powers would be direct counterparts to the powers the Raiders already have and to throw in some extra gameplay variety because fighting the same 3 types if elites with minor faction deviations has gotten kinda stale for me.

[TheBrentWoody]

I agree.  Should give each faction types their own ability, don't think it'd be that difficult.  Could even make some passively better with aleph number.  Like faster sniping.  Wouldn't save them up close, but would fuck people up.